Malversation raps to be filed against Davide, 14 others

Cebu Gov. Hilario Davide III and Provincial Board Member Grecilda Sanchez-Zaballero are accused of malversation of public funds by One Cebu.
CDN FILE

CEBU Gov. Hilario Davide III, a Capitol treasurer, a provincial board member and 12 barangay chiefs and treasurers will be facing malversation raps before the Ombudsman for Visayas.

One Cebu Party said in a statement that the party will file a complaint for malversation of public funds against Davide, OIC Provincial Treasurer Emmanuel Guial, Provincial Board (PB) Member Grecilda Sanchez-Zaballero and 12 barangay officials from Asturias town.

In the letter-complaint addressed to Paul Elmer M. Clemente, Deputy Ombudsman for Visayas, the political party, through Mel Abnir Amadora, the head of its legal division, the party accused them of violation of Article 217 of the Revised Penal Code or the malversation of public funds.

Amadora said in a statement that they will probably file the complaint on Monday (April 25) or Tuesday (April 26).

The complaint is related to the release of P40 million to various local government units (LGUs) belonging to the third legislative district of Cebu. That amount was released by the Office of the Provincial Treasurer last March.

The recipient local government units allegedly are headed by known political supporters or allies of Davide, a gubernatorial candidate of the Liberal Party (LP) and Sanchez, LP candidate for Congressman in the 3rd district.

The complaint identified six barangays in Asturias as those that received the P1 million amount. These are Tubod, Libogon, Agbanga, Bairan, Lanao and Poblacion.

“The P1 million was  supposed to be released for the beautification project of Sanchez.  It was also made to appear, from a document emanating from the Office of the Provincial Treasurer and signed by Cashier Maricar Sanchez Rosario (a cousin of SP member Zaballero), that the amounts were all released on March 17, 2016,” a statement from One Cebu said.

Davide, when asked to comment on the possible filing of the complaint, told Cebu Daily News that filing cases has always been the favorite pastime of the One Cebu camp, which he said is a “desperate move.”

“Despicable move from a desperate candidate. We have nothing to fear, so bring it on,” Davide said, adding that he will answer the complaint at the appropriate time.

Sanchez-Zaballero said this is just one of the “dirty tricks” that “desperate candidates” would do.

“For the record, the project is legitimate and across the board. There is no monkey business in that project. I am inviting them to check the implementation in each barangay given such program. If they are asking why not all were given, it is simply because others requested for other projects such as road opening, water system  etc. While these barangays requested for cash for work for their barangay,” Sanchez-Zaballero told CDN in a text message.

Sanchez said they even welcome an audit from the Commission on Audit on this project.

One Cebu said in a statement that Davide and Sanchez-Zaballero claimed that everything was in order and there was no discrimination in the release of the funds, but this was rebuffed by officials of Asturias, Pinamungajan and Aloguinsan, who are allied with the political opposition or One Cebu.

One Cebu said that their requests for funding remain unheeded.